Magic...true magic...the power to change the outcome of events and to reshape the world, is something most of us have wished for at one time or another. We all think it might make the difficulties of every day struggles in a cold and uncaring world easier by some degree. Jericho Germanicus could counsel us on such a misbegotten desire; because he knows at least one thing we do not. Covetous power is coveted, and as part of the bargain of having magic, is dealing with those who would, driven by greed, take it at any price. As our story begins Amber Germanicus, Jericho's granddaughter is about to turn 11 years old, and about to awaken to the magic long bred into their family line. To harbor the family gift so special that that it has been sought by a dark and sinister cult named The Silent Legacy for over a decade, Jericho Germanicus has had to live in hiding raising his granddaughter in secrecy and has had to keep the secret of her magic even from her. When magic becomes a threat to family, there are choices that must be made; there are sacrifices which must be made. To save the life of Amber, Jericho, knowing that the fates must keep an even balance within the universe, knows a life must be demanded...Jericho chooses to lay down his own. He had devoted many years of research and study into finding a way to keep the Silent Legacy from stealing Amber's gift...the family gift...and believes that he has found the only answer in his epic plan of self-sacrifice, but even that depends on the cooperation of Madame Zadia Gray, a carnival sideshow psychic. He has given Amber all of the knowledge he can without exposing the secret of her magic. He has found unlikely allies in Madame Zadia and the members of a carnival sideshow to help him carry out his plan. And he has chosen to bear the price of his own life to see it through. All too soon, and a moment too late, Jericho finds that he has been a pawn of the Silent Legacy all along, because they sought a much bigger prize than just his granddaughter...and he has been the vehicle for them to accomplish it...in fact he has placed them within reach of commanding all magic yet alive in the secret corners of the world...if he could let his allies know this before he is taken, they might make much better decisions...but he cannot...which is perfectly according to the Silent Legacy's plan. As the fates would have it, there are things which are even beyond magic...things that course through the minds and the hearts of everyday man. There are memories of broken pasts...there are losses and regrets which lie quietly behind the eyes...there are bonds and trusts which will not be broken because some people have felt the pain of loss before and simply could not bear it again. What the greatest wizard in the world could not weigh the value of, is second nature to those who are named freaks in a carnival side show, shunned of society, scoffed at, and considered less than human by even the least of society. What possibility tomorrow holds has been delivered into the hands of the psychic, a strong man, a dwarf, a dog-faced boy, and the young Amber Germanicus. Each untrained in the arts of magic...burdened by past failures and regrets...aware that the enemy is much larger and more powerful than he or she could even hope to be. The one thing that all can agree upon is that sideshow families stick together, and that Jericho has bound himself to the family. They must save him...or die trying. Set before them is a monumental task with little hope of success, and they quickly know, even as they walk into it, that not everyone will not all come out of this unchanged...as a matter of fact not everyone will make it out unscarred...not everyone will make it out alive.

How can something as complex as a human body create itself from a single fertilized egg? Drawing on ideas from physics and network theory as well as genetics and embryology, Jamie Davies describes the fascinating picture emerging from the latest research, in which complexity builds up through 'adaptive self-organization'.

Martin Heidegger's work is pivotal in the history of modern European philosophy. The New Heidegger presents a comprehensive and stimulating overview of, and introduction to, the work of one of the most influential and controversial philosophers of our time. Heidegger has had an extraordinary impact on contemporary philosophical and extra-philosophical life: on deconstruction, hermeneutics, ontology, technology and techno-science, art and architecture, politics, psychotherapy, and ecology. The New Heidegger takes a thematic approach to Heidegger's work, covering not only the seminal Being and Time, but also Heidegger's lesser known works. Lively, clear and succinct, the book requires no prior knowledge of Heidegger and is an essential resource for anyone studying or teaching the work of this major modern philosopher.

Melville's Philosophies departs from a long tradition of critical assessments of Melville that dismissed his philosophical capacities as ingenious but muddled. Its contributors do not apply philosophy to Melville in order to detect just how much of it he knew or understood. To the contrary, they try to hear the philosophical arguments themselves-often very strange and quite radical-that Melville never stopped articulating and reformulating. What emerges is a Melville who is materialistically oriented in a radical way, a Melville who thinks about life forms not just in the context of contemporary sciences but also ontologically. Melville's Philosophies recovers a Melville who is a thinker of great caliber, which means obliquely but dramatically reversing the way the critical tradition has characterized his ideas. Finally, as a result of the readings collected here, Melville emerges as a very relevant thinker for contemporary philosophical concerns, such as the materialist turn, climate change, and post-humanism.

Challenges the conventional view of the nature of time.

Heidegger's lifelong project of exposing and deconstructing the presuppositions governing the history of metaphysics begins with the conception of temporality outlined in Being and Time, a work which Heidegger never completed. In Thinking in the Light of Time, de Boer not only traces the notion of temporality developed in Being and Time, but goes beyond the published portion of that work to offer a reconstruction of its pivotal third division based on a systematic interpretation of other works, many of which have only recently been published. Emphasizing the continuity between Heidegger's early and later thought, de Boer provides a systematic interpretation of Heidegger's work as a whole. Hegel's claim to have perfected metaphysics is central to de Boer's concern with Heidegger's attempt to deconstruct metaphysics. Heidegger's struggles to come to terms with Hegel's speculative science, especially the manner in which Hegel regards his own project as founded upon an understanding of time, is thus one of the focal points of de Boer's interpretation of Heidegger's deconstruction of metaphysics. De Boer argues that it is especially in his reading of Hegel that one sees how deeply Heidegger is committed to the attempt to do justice to the radical finitude of human life and its possible philosophical self-interpretations. Her reading of Heidegger shows how his works paved the way for the deconstructive efforts that guide Derrida's thought.

A clear and comprehensive handbook to a revered path of meditation. This step-by-step meditator’s guide walks the reader through practices that can hold the key to unlocking new levels of concentration and insight. A student of the famed Pa-Auk Monastery and a practicing psychiatrist, Jeon Hyun-soo, MD, PhD, uses these two paths to guide the reader to a new understanding of themselves and the world around them. Drawing both from Jeon’s own experience with Pa-Auk Sayadaw and from the words of the Buddha, this is an authentic and practical guide to samatha, materiality, mentality, dependent origination, and vipassana.